Stadium Deals

[Gibson2Worthington]

This is relating to local clubs, not NBL teams.

I'm from a club in Melbourne and we think we are getting a bad deal relating to what we pay for court hire for our local comps, rep ball and training.

We pay over $30 an hour to hire a court from our council. We also have to hire all 3 courts at our stadium out, even if they aren't being used.

We are trying to build a case to take to council and are interested in what other clubs are paying.

If anyone is willing to share with me any details about their stadium deals it would be much appreciated. Don't need to name the club or anything if you don't wish.

I understand some clubs pay a yearly rent and are given pretty much 24/7 access to do what they want, allowing them to generate more income. However we are pretty much breaking even as all our game fees go straight back to refs and court hire.

Any information would be appreciated.

[Skindog the Hawk]

Couple of questions - how many hours per week do you rent your courts for? Is there a way of compressing your games so that you can maximise the value for money that you get for your rental??

With regards to what is a "fair" price to pay to access the venue, I completely disagree with your councils' policy of charging you for the whole 3 courts, however if they're not going to budge on that, then I would broach the subject of you "sub-letting" the unused courts for either 3-on-3, casual shooting, or something similar to another body. :confused:

Either way, if you're having to outlay $90 p.h. for 3 courts when you're not using all of it then that's a big issue.

SD.

[Loz]

If anyone is willing to share with me any details about their stadium deals it would be much appreciated. Don't need to name the club or anything if you don't wish.

I've got a fair bit of experience in this area. PM me and I'll help you out.

[Coach Carter]

I'm from one of the 17 Domestic clubs within the Knox Association.

Training venues have always been a pressure point. We have 30 junior teams in our club and 650+ junior teams across the 17 clubs in the association.

In our club, teams up to u18 are allocated a one hour training session per week - u18 and over is optional (between school and work, you may not get a full team able to train). We offer reduced fees to teams that do not train. I know of some clubs that only train for 45 minutes (reasons are a mix of cost and available space).

The main Knox 6 court stadium can only be used for domestic training weekdays between 4:00pm and 6:00pm because it is in use for seniors games most weeknights and Rep games on Friday night.

We have not trained there for a while but it was very well priced at $22 per hour (inc GST). It has likely gone up a bit since.

We use three local schools for our training - the court costs vary slightly between $22 per hour and $25 per hour plus GST.

Our training budget is approximately $460 per week (just on $9000 per season) and we work hard at the start of each season to pair teams to a half-court each. The more single court teams we have, the more expensive it is.

In summary, schools in the Knox area seem to provide reasonable rates.
The most expensive venue I know of is the Rowville Community Centre that I believe is in the high $30's ($36?) per hour. Good venue (heated and airconditioned courts, etc but expensive)

Our arrangements with the schools also vary a bit.
At one of our schools - where we have been a long term tenant (14 years) - we have an excellent relationship with the Bursar. We are only invoiced for time we use so when finals come around and we drop off training for those teams whose season is over, we pay less. We are very honest about this because it is an excellent relationship for us.

Another school sticks to the letter of our user contract, we are invoiced for all contracted hours and we have to give two weeks written notice to change. I have no problem with this as it is what we signed up for.

Another issue is that there is a shortage of quality courts available for training. Once a club gets a venue, they are reluctant to release it. We do therefore sub-let some of our court space occasionally.

You mention the council in your post but no mention of school venues. Have you looked at this?